Morning all. Very unattractive out there this morning. Wet and very overcast meaning that I need a light on. Mme was very pleased to speak to her sister last night who is now home after her stroke. Two weeks in Watford General, followed by two weeks in a specialist unit to work on her speech and mobility. Hopefully she will keep working at it and make an almost full recovery, but that is up to her and her husband. Have a good day whatever the weather.
Drat - the old family business has been rumbled... https://www.eveningexpress.co.uk/fp...al-whisky-stills-in-the-north-and-north-east/
Morning all. Grey with occasional showers and not very warm again. The house next door had an English estate agent arrive and open up, so fully expected to see some prospective buyers arrive for a viewing. She waited half an hour, no one turned up, so she shut the shutters and drove off. It seems to be quite common from the tales we hear. Not very helpful to the agent who has had a wasted fifty mile round trip. Have a good and fruitful day.
Some of you will remember I wrote to the club about continuing Hive live match broadcasts post Chinese covid. I received a reply this morning and I not surprised by the response, but if you don't ask you don't get! Back to streaming or IPTV I guess Dear Fred Thank you so much for taking the time to write to the club’s Chairman directly. He shared your letter with me so that we could acknowledge it and express our gratitude for taking the time to get in touch. With regards to your request about Hive Live, I’m afraid that in the Premier League the club do not hold any of the rights to transmit live video streaming of its matches. Premier League broadcast rights are sold in nearly every country in the world, and the UK forms a key part of their market. If our game isn’t selected for live transmission by UK broadcasters, then it’ll usually be available to watch in edited form shortly after full-time. We are planning to continue Hive Live broadcasts, but they will likely be away from matchdays given the situation I’ve set out above. With our warmest wishes, Richard on behalf of Scott
A little concerning to see that the Indian variant of the coronavirus has been detected on a large new housing estate on the edge of Aylesbury, just fields away from where my daughter lives. The PM has been telling parliament that there is "increasing concern" at the way it is popping up, and a rural area seems an unusual place for it to require mass testing. Anyone who thinks it is all done and dusted will be disappointed.
Today I was in need of my granddaughter to translate for me. Greater details tomorrow no doubt. However I learnt something tonight that has cheered me up. When my little ones came to France and went to primary school for the first time, they were taught French to some degree phonetically. Part of the learning involved watching the difference in the way that people used their mouths for different words that might sound the same. It can be difficult to distinguish at full speed between panne (breakdown) or pain (bread) as an example. I have found that not seeing people's lips moving has set back my language skills such as they are. Watching French TV where masks are not worn sometimes is much easier. I discovered this evening that it is not just me, but three granddaughters that are having problems, without realizing just how much we actually watch as well as listen.
There are different opinions about this, a good example of why people should worry being expressed in this piece. https://inews.co.uk/opinion/indian-variant-covid-cases-lockdown-easing-government-data-997623 What is factual is that at UK level, after doubling weekly, the new variant more than tripled last week (from 520 to 1700 cases).
There's a large outbreak of it in Moray - large enough to warrant the shire being the only one not to move down a level last week. A tad too close for comfort for us as, being close to the border, we do 80% of our shopping there. It's very much a rural area too, so how it got there is anyone's guess - although the large RAF base is being viewed with suspicion by many of the locals.
Morning all. Sunshine, showers and windy again for our third public holiday so far in May. Yesterday my car broke down when the clutch pedal went to the floor and stayed there. Nothing to do but call out the rescue lorry and have it transported to a garage. We were not far from our daughter, and she came out to see if we needed a lift home. Meanwhile I was having trouble understanding and being understood via a iffy mobile signal by a lady in the call centre, who must have been wearing a mask as I haven't had that problem before. Granddaughter took over and arrangements sorted. Very good for a 17 year old. No idea why the car broke down as it had a new clutch in December. As it is a holiday today I will have to wait until tomorrow to find out. Have a good day everyone.
I had that problem years ago in Oz. I used to drive around in an old Hillman Minx which some kind soul abandoned in our driveway - on one journey over a particularly bumpy country road, the same thing happened to the clutch - the spring had fallen off. We fixed the problem by taking the spring out of a retractable ballpoint pen and continued on our merry way. That spring lasted for two years - it finally gave up the ghost after driving to Sydney to take my flatmates to the airport to return to England.
Morning all. A stiff breeze blowing the clouds over, so one moment it is bright sunshine, the next dark cloud that looks like it might be bearing more rain. Hanging around at the moment waiting to find out what is wrong with the car, what the cost will be and when they can repair it. Mme has a little Fiesta that is more than 20 years old, and apart from a flat battery through lack of use, little goes wrong with it. In years past I became very used to going to car graveyards looking for pieces that I could replace on one of my old cars, but today when I lift the bonnet I am not sure what half the stuff in there is. Have a good day whatever you are doing.
Morning all. Grey, not very warm and a general feeling of dampness just like an English Autumn day, nothing like a French Spring morning. The garage that I did all of my dealings with became a casualty of the pandemic and closed. The one that has my car at the moment is not filling me with confidence. Laid back and cheerful they may be, but when it takes me to suggest that a hydraulic problem might just be the cause of the pedal on floor condition, I start to wonder. Still they did know where the reservoir was, and a dipping of finger into the bottle confirmed it was empty. It will be a minor problem and not very expensive, so would you like us to clean your headlight lenses while we have it? Fine, but how much is not very expensive? We will telephone you. Still I wait, but whatever I may see my car again around next Wednesday. Have a good day whatever the weather.
Morning All. Had my second jab yesterday. Sore shoulder but otherwise no ill effects. Excellent news on the Season Ticket front. Traffic noticeably heavier on my daily commute, not helped by the wanton vandalism to the countryside by hs2 and their goons... what was a lovely journey past woodland and farm fields is now mesh fences, tree stumps, boring rigs and a constant flow of pickup trucks and the aforementioned orange clad goons (they can't drive either!) blocking up the road. Oh yeah... and come on you Foxes!